My comments are relative to a Olympus C2020 Zoom, various Power Macintosh
computers and a pair of Epson color printers.
Mike Larson wrote:
> I've resisted the temptation to go digital.
> However a friend (who recently switched)
> makes a compelling argument for me to
> invest in digital. It goes like this:
>
> With digital he takes more and better
> pictures because:
> he doesn't worry about film and
> processing costs,
This is true. I only worry about running out of memory on my SmartMedia
cards. I've got 64MB and 32MB cards and I get about 1 piture/MB. So when
I'm away from my PowerBook I have about 90 photos in SHQ JPEG mode, the
highest quailty compressed photos I can take on my Oly digicam.
> he instantly see the results and
> retakes the shot if necessary
Yes but don't throw the first picture away. I have gotten home and
preferred the "Bad" shot to the retake as far as exposure goes. This is
because the LCD on the back doesn't render colors the same way as my 14.1"
LCD does on my laptop, go figure. I've tried adjusting the brightness up a
few notches to desaturate the colors a bit. My monitor is closer to what my
printer prints than the LCD on the back of the camera.
> he prints immediately when he get home.
> No mailing off film for developing.
No argument here except the quality of the film processed by the lab is
better quality and more durable than anything in an affordable printer.
I've also had a problem with my Epson printers doing a lousy job with reds
and I haven't had time to do the color calibration on the printer that I
need to do. If I had a scanner that were easier to attach I'd scan my
prints.
> Would any list members who use both
> mediums care to comments on my friends
> thoughts?
>
I've had a digital camera for about a year and like it for 900f what I
want to do. I have found a lab, that for a price, will do real prints from
my digital images. I haven't used them yet but the sample they showed me
was very impressive.
There are a couple of problems that are very prevalent in digital cameras
with the 2.1 Megapixel CCD.
One is a purple ring around any extremely overexposed white areas. In the
4X6" prints I have done, if the area is small, is hardly noticeable, and can
actually be used to good effect if you know what to expect when you take the
picture. Let me know and I have one extremely good sample that I can post
to my PhotoPoint page if anyone is interested.
The other problem is with dark backgrounds not being as smooth graident as
you can get from film. This is partly due to the JPEG algorithm the cameras
use, but this is even true in TIFF mode, to a lesser extent.
These first two problems are when doing "normal" exposures, using a shutter
speed of 1/4 second or faster.
These problems get Sagans (orders of magnitude) worse as you go beyond 1/2
second exposure times, or use faster IOS settings. My camera has 100, 200
and 400 ISO speed "film" ratings. I never use 400.
Other things to think about are the cycle times are much slower than you can
get with 35mm. Even in "Motor drive" mode I can take only about 4 pictures
in SHQ-JPEG mode before the buffer is full. Then I have to wait for the
buffer to empty, it seems like forever, before I can continue shooting.
When the camera is in sleep mode it still takes 10 seconds or so for it to
wake up to the point to where it can take a picture, and another second or
so once you press the shutter button. There are ways to overcome this, like
presetting the focusing distance, and setting the IOS to something besides
AUTO, basically minimizing the decisions the camera needs to make.
I borrowed an OM-2 this summer and I found focusing hard to do. I am
comparing mostly to an old Yashica MAT-EM medium format camera where
focusing is a breeze on a 2-1/4" ground glass with a maximum aperture of
f/3.5, actually the focusing aperture may be even wider. I even find
focusing my digicam in manual mode easier than the OM-2.
Also be aware that digicams have a more square format than 35mm. It doesn't
sound like much of a difference, but 35mm prints look almost panoramic to me
now.
For me, I need the instant gratification of a digicam and am chomping at the
bit when I need to get film processed just to see if I got any good shots.
I also save all of my original images to CD-ROM and make 3 copies of each.
One to use and two backups one to mom as an offsite backup and one to my
wife in case I lose my copy.
I hope I didn't bore anyone to death.
--
Mark Thalman
Hex, Bugs, and Rock'n Roll!
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